Why Coachability Matters More Than Coaching with MaryAnn Gramig

In this episode of Career Coaching Secrets, our guest is MaryAnn Gramig, a respected voice in personal and professional development who brings a powerful perspective on what truly drives success. MaryAnn explores the critical role of coachability, emphasizing that real transformation comes not just from guidance but from the individual’s willingness to take consistent, focused action—especially when no one is watching. She shares practical wisdom on discipline, accountability, and how tapping into your internal resources can unlock meaningful progress toward your goals. This conversation is a must-listen for anyone serious about growth, offering a refreshing and honest take on what it really takes to achieve lasting results.

You can find her on:
https://www.calmyourinnercritic.com/
https://www.facebook.com/magauthenticacoaching
https://www.instagram.com/maryann_gramig/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/maryanngramig/
Book: Howl of the Whisper

Transcript

MaryAnn Gramig 0:00

From the client's perspective, they've got two options. So I have an action taker VIP day intensive. Some people have an issue, a program that they want to come in. We spend a full day together, really spend layer laser-focused time on a strategy, what their outcome needs to be, what's blocking them.

Davis Nguyen 0:20

Welcome to Career Coaching Secrets, the podcast where we talk with successful career coaches on how they built their success and the hard lessons they learned along the way. My name is Davis Wynne and I'm the founder of Purple Circle, where we help career coaches scale their business to $100,000 years, $100,000 months, and even $100,000 weeks. Before Purple Circle, I've grown several seven and eight figure career coaching businesses myself and have been a consultant at two career coaching businesses that are doing over $100 million each. Whether you're an established coach or building your practice for the first time, you'll discover the secrets to elevating your coaching business.

Pedro Stein 0:51

Welcome to Career Coaching Secrets Podcast. I'm Pedro, and today I'm joined by Marianne Graymick, who has built her expertise across diverse industries from horse and bourbon to healthcare and education, understanding that leadership challenges transcend any single sector. What drew me to Marianne's work is her recognition that even successful leaders who've climbed the ladder often face an internal gap, experiencing imposter syndrome or burnout while still being expected to fill everyone else's needs. Marianne specializes in helping high-achieving leaders move from status quo to stratus fear through fearless insights and transformation rooted in their unique strengths. Her approach addresses the fundamental question of who helps the helpers, providing the self-leadership development that allows leaders to serve their teams from a place of authentic strength rather than hidden struggle. Welcome to the show, Marianne.

MaryAnn Gramig 1:59

Thank you, Pedro. I'm excited to be here.

Pedro Stein 2:03

Yeah, great to have you from the moment we met. I'm also super pumped. And you know, I like to backtrack a little back to the origin story, you know, because every coach has that moment where they look at their life and say, yeah, I guess this is what I'm doing now, right? So when was that for you, Marianne?

MaryAnn Gramig 2:22

Oh, that for me was about seven years ago. I had been introduced to Clifton Strengths in 2007 when I was the VP for policy and operations for an anti-obscenity uh organization, nonprofit I was working with that was dealing with the trauma and struggles of sex workers being trafficked and being um abused. And it was a it was a very hard work, a dark time, but a very huge purpose. So that was when I first was introduced to Clifton Strengths and leaned into it from working wound up to becoming the the president of the organization. Then life shifted and I felt like I needed a change, and so I began leading a nonprofit, a community leadership organization that did leadership development uh here in the state of Kentucky and did that. And while I was doing that, I brought Clifton Strengths and just introduced it to our board of directors, and we began offering it as one of the things that donors could get at a certain tier level of donation, they could get uh Clifton Strengths leadership uh help with the assessment. And I just started doing that on the side. Well, our revenue increased in 24 months by 150% because the demand for leadership coaching and training from a strengths-based perspective was so high in addition to the leadership we were already teaching, that the donors are wanting someone to come into their companies and do this specifically for them. So the demand grew to such that I couldn't be the executive director of the nonprofit anymore and do the consulting and coaching. So I went to the board and said, we need to expand. And the best way to do that is if I step out as executive director, because the nonprofit at that time could not pay an executive director and a professional coach consultant. So I stepped off and decided that I would become officially certified professionally in Gallup Clifton Strengths, and then we hired a new executive director. Uh, and then that's how the company was born. Um, to where I just hung out my shingle, got certifications and training and coaching, used uh my other leadership background and training I already had, and here I am. That was 20 late 2018. Here we are in 2026.

Pedro Stein 4:57

Hmm. So it sounds like you're pretty used to tough conversations. We're talking about anti-obscenity, nonprofit, right?

MaryAnn Gramig 5:05

Uh-huh. Yes.

Pedro Stein 5:06

I mean, I can only imagine that sometimes dealing with coaching challenges, let it put, let's put it like that, it's like not a walk in the park, but it's not as hard. You've been you've seen worse, right? When someone is like trying to second guess themselves and talking about imposter syndrome and all that, you're like, you know, honey, I've seen a little bit worse. So it does it make easier for you to navigate those conversations.

MaryAnn Gramig 5:31

I think that it does because um my worst day coaching will never be as bad as even my best day of working in that sector and the things that we had to deal with and see um from the the the CD side, the corrupt criminal side, all the way to government officials uh and law enforcement that were working at times in tandem with organizations that were perpetuating the this violent cycle. Uh so there's a a lot of stress and discomfort, and so nothing compares you know to that. But to the client, what they're facing is you know, disturbing their world. They're having a disruption in who they know themselves to be or they've lost confidence in themselves. So, in a way, it's very similar. The women that we worked with, the nonprofit organization, they totally lost who they were, who they were created to be, their beautiful uniqueness. And it was just on such a very, very damaging level in that way. But a lot of my clients are experiencing things that way too. They're dysregulated, their lives are being disruptive, and it may be not that glaring or graphic, but internally, you know, when you don't feel in alignment, Pedro, it's like it affects everything.

Pedro Stein 6:57

Yes, it's the whole person, right? That it's a myth that we can separate like the professional life and the personal life because they intertwine eventually, and one affects the other. Now, what I would love to understand is like the shift, right? Like you started doing some leadership work and then you eventually went to to get some certifications that dove into the coaching practice and all of that. Now, but I want to understand the identity shift, like from I'm helping people to I'm building a real business around coaching, you know, you know that shift. I'm not sure if it's the first invoice, I'm not sure if the if it's the certification, the first paying client. How did that play out for you?

MaryAnn Gramig 7:38

Yeah, that played out really, really well. Uh, and I'll I'll shout out to uh a coach named Brent O'Bannon, who was the first certified strengths coach in the world for Gallup. Uh, and he had a mastermind that he ran for brand new certified coaches. And when I found out about that, I immediately signed up. Uh, one of the greatest things about your personal development is to acknowledge that you don't know everything and you don't know what you don't know. So I was looking for experts in the field that had a proven track record. And Brent specifically specializes in working with new coaches to get their arms around how to build this business. I've been in the nonprofit world for so long to build a profit-driven business that was still serving. It was just, it can be a disconnect. And so he was very helpful in all of the tools and guts and nuts and bolts of what it takes to have a business that is scalable and really how to monetize in a way that your primary focus is still serving, but you have to sell those services in order to provide those services. I wasn't running a nonprofit anymore. I wasn't running a charity. And by doing that properly and learning from coaches and business coaches like Brent, I now have the freedom. I just sat down and talked to a faith-based nonprofit this morning. Um, and we're gonna do some pro bono work for them. And I'm in a position to do that because the business is healthy.

Pedro Stein 9:24

So kudos to him for helping you, right? So we can impact more people and coaches.

MaryAnn Gramig 9:29

Oh, absolutely. Yes, yes.

Pedro Stein 9:32

Now, after you got rolling, right, and in the early days of coaching, and this happens a lot. We see a lot of coaches trying to embrace the entire world, right? Trying to help everyone and all that. So, who are the people that kept showing up? I'm not sure if it was the nonprofit or that you had your background on it, or different people, you know, the the ones you realize, okay, this is my tribe, you know, even if you get to that point eventually.

MaryAnn Gramig 9:55

Right, right. So primarily I coach women who are finding themselves in a professional or leadership role, not completely. I do have a few male clients, primarily women who are in a middle management, middle leadership professional, all the way up to the C-suite level. And they're not looking for work-life balance, they think they are, but they're looking on how to integrate the best of themselves as a strong female leader. But what does that look like when most of like from even my generation and ahead of me were told you're trying to be little men, little businessmen, and that just that doesn't work for anyone. And so women who are trying to identify their own unique leadership style and be taken seriously in a room full of men without trying to act like a man or think like a man or dress like a man, um, it is a challenge, and I focus and work a lot with uh female leaders on that.

Pedro Stein 11:04

Okay. Now walk me through how do those women usually find you, you know, in the first place, marketing-wise, you know.

MaryAnn Gramig 11:14

Right. So when I'm invited to speak, say at a women's leadership organization or luncheon or at a corporate event, then women will be interested, and men sometimes into coming into the coaching programs that I run. I have two offers that they will choose from. And then it has been had to do very little hard, hard marketing because the word of mouth just when people are getting results, and then someone says, um, hey, I'm, you know, struggling in this area, I think I need a coach. Don't you have a have a coach? Who's your coach? If you are the coach that your client says, Yes, you need to meet my coach, because they are experiencing the growth and the transformation that is giving them the clarity and alignment that they need, then I mean it the services sell themselves. Uh, and I think if you're really clear on what's a good fit, there are clients that are wonderful people, potential clients. They are not a good fit. I'm not, this will shock you, Pedro. I'm not everyone's cup of tea. And that's okay. I have other coaches that I'm aligned with, that I have relationships with, I collaborate with, that I will say that would be a good fit. I want to refer you to, you know, Coach Sarah or Coach David, uh, and really make sure they get where they belong.

Pedro Stein 12:44

Okay. Now let's pretend one thing. Let's pretend I have a sister. She's called Pedra. Okay.

MaryAnn Gramig 12:50

Pedra, okay.

Pedro Stein 12:51

Pedra. She's uh she's a woman, okay. She's in a leadership role, C-suite level. Okay. Uh-huh. And she went to a lunch and learn. She, I'm not sure, looked at your received a referral. Okay. I told her you're great. Okay. It was a past client, some something like that. And she eventually gets in a call with you or your team, and not sure how that plays out, but eventually uh you guys connect and she's like, Yeah, I want to know what working with you looks like, right? And from her perspective, Pedro, okay. How would it look like to work with you? How does your coaching practice work structure-wise, from the client's perspective?

MaryAnn Gramig 13:29

Right. From the client's perspective, they've got two options. So I have an action taker VIP day intensive. Some people have an issue program that they want to come in. We spend a full day together, really spend your laser-focused time on a strategy, what their outcome needs to be, what's blocking them. Are they feeling stagnant? Are they in overwhelm, burnout? Um, are they navigating a situation that's not psychologically safe for them? They need better boundaries, and how their strengths, we go through and identify those and work with those, can propel them back to where they're in a state of alignment, confidence in who they are and what they're called to do in this season of their life. Some people want a little longer journey. So I have a 90-day leadership reset, and that is every three weeks for 90 days, we meet in a one-hour session and pick one or two topics. Sometimes the most popular way they like to divide that up is one work issue and maybe one something in their personal life, a personal goal. And we incorporate a lot of well-being into that, scientific-based factors on how the impact of not having a good sense or state of well-being impacts everything else, and come together in a more practical way of kind of a going along with them every three weeks with support in between of the assignment that we're working on, the task that they've chosen to really take an action item between sessions. And that plays out over the 90-day period to where they now have a good place where they've gained some traction. They've had some wins. I'm a big believer in micro goals where you get small wins, not just to say, yay, I have a win, but it's propelling you. It's like a stair step, and you're climbing in a very positive way and you're getting stronger as you climb. Because you know, the first couple of steps on the staircase are pretty easy, Pedro. But the time you get up to the top, if you're not really in shape, you're gonna be winded. And my clients get to the top, they're not winded, and sometimes they realize this isn't even the staircase I want to be on anymore. Because they're so in alignment, they're realizing maybe they've been settling, or maybe they've not been showing up the best they could, and they need to make some changes. They either need to change themselves and work on that, or they need to change the people around them geographically. Maybe it's time for a shift, a new career. Maybe it's time to have the confidence to go in and ask for the promotion.

Pedro Stein 16:18

Hmm. Okay. Well, first of all, I felt personally attacked. Okay.

Speaker 3 16:24

If you're not in shape, Pedro, I'm like, what does she have a camera here?

Pedro Stein 16:30

What's happening?

Speaker 3 16:32

Okay, I'm just gonna put it out there. That's one thing.

MaryAnn Gramig 16:36

In shape competence-wise, Pedro, your competence level.

Pedro Stein 16:40

Okay, that's oh my god, you know, that's just my inner self.

MaryAnn Gramig 16:44

Okay, I know we've got the you know, I have a little inner critic. Uh, that is a cool issue that we work on in my coaching, is the inner critic.

Pedro Stein 16:52

Okay, but we're talking about Pedra. Back to Pedra. I have a question. Yes, Pedra's inner inner critic. Love that. Now, let's say you're coaching her, right? Um, and she's like, you know what, Marianne? This sounds great. We're doing work, it's looking good. Would you able to coach my team as well? You know, considering she's a CEO, for example. Would you like would you does your business consider one of many uh engagement, for example?

MaryAnn Gramig 17:20

Yes, uh, I have organizational clients, and we have a whole uh journey to strengths mastery, is what we call it. Um, I'm part of a collaborative that uh Authentic has set up with coaches that can handle uh we are in an engagement right now. Our most current engagement is with the 500 employees uh that are going through uh strengths-based leadership, self-leadership, team leadership. And then this CEO is very forward-thinking, very progressive. He wants it for every staff member in the organization. So we'll have another session with the next set of 120 employees, and these are all the way down the hierarchy to those frontline people. So we handle uh healthcare organizations, uh, the state of Kentucky Department of Education has been a client, so yes, I love to go into organizations because we're very specific about how we do that. We'll have sometimes a leader will say, you know, I've got some problem employees. Could you come in and kind of, you know, fix them? Uh no, we don't do that. There, I guarantee you that the employee is not the sole issue of why you're feeling tension or stress. Let's go in, come in and do an assessment. And we work from the leadership from the top down. The first thing we do is get executive leadership alignment. Most companies think they have it. Most could be better aligned because they there may not be a situation of complete psychological safety where you've got all of that learner safety, inclusion safety, challenger safety, um, to where people can really put forth an idea uh and know that it's they're not going to be ridiculed for it or or poo-pooed uh or just asked to sit in the back and be quiet.

Pedro Stein 19:20

Hmm. Okay. Two things first. I worked at a company, okay, an IT company, and the owner had his daughter taking care of HR. And it sounded like nobody cared. She was like, she she had all these these plans, right? And structure and all that. She was very progressive, but the management uh didn't listen to her and did their own thing, and it sounded like the owner was less like trying to keep her busy, and she had like just great ideas and all that, but in reality, they didn't have their buy-in. Okay, that's one thing. So I get that. And the other thing now that I'm really curious about is like, okay, you're called out by the you're called in, sorry, by the CEO, right? So the CEO gets it. You even mentioned pretty progressive. Now, how to create that connection with everyone and different levels, right? There are some people that don't even grasp what coaching is. So that's right. Can you walk me through how to navigate that?

MaryAnn Gramig 20:20

Yes, yes. So that is how we have a roadmap, a pathway that we go over with senior leadership, with CEO and senior leadership about how to, if they're really serious about a strengths-based-based culture at their organization, that it takes time. It's uh to hit it at its really most effective, it's a three-year journey because you can't just go in. Like you said, some people have never been given the opportunity to take any kind of assessment on talent or personality or growth. And so no one's invested in them before. And that's a huge thing. These frontline workers that have been given the opportunity to not only take the Clifton Strengths assessment and then receive training on what that means for them and their teams, just that alone, they feel seen that the CEO and he has been there for every training. He clears his schedule for that day and they see him and he's investing in them and he welcomes them. And they can walk up and shake his hand and ask him a question. So you start with getting the buy-in that it's a culture change, that they're committed to this up to 36 month journey. We also encourage that they get in house coaches after we, you know, ride off into the sunset. They should be able to maintain this on their own. Start at the C suite level, go down to the next layer of leadership. So it's kind of like a snowball. You have this snowball effect, and you're picking everybody and gathering everybody up, and everybody's coming along for the ride. And every Everyone from the top of how to give psychologically safe feedback and guidance all the way down to the newest employee at the lowest tier of service to that organization knows what they should expect in psychologically safe feedback and growth in the company. And when everybody's on the same page, and then side-to-side feedback. If you have an issue, you're going to spend a lot more time dealing with the guy next to you and the gal on the other side that may or may not be working towards the mission well. What most people don't say anything. Or those who do, you know, think about most of the feedback that you get. It's usually not that great. It's not that positive. So it needs to be accountable. But from a strengths perspective, you can hold someone accountable by saying, I have seen you use your activator strength so many times on projects. And this time, do you think something got in the way of that? Because I just didn't see that spark from you this time. You're letting them know, hey, you kind of missed the mark for our team this time, but you're not attacking. And they can talk more about it because they've been trained in what a balcony level of their strengths looks like and what a basement level when it's really bottom floor looks like. And they're taught in this culture change, Pedra, to go up with together. If somebody on the team's not performing well, the team's not going to perform well. You're all responsible. Responsible for being sure that you're being the best teammate you can be. You're not responsible that their work is slacking, but you're responsible that you're not contributing to the problem.

Pedro Stein 23:47

Okay. Interesting. I mean, your work seems pretty hands-on, right, Marianne. We're talking about group engagement, we're talking about one-on-one. We're talking about business development and all that entails. So, how do you think about capacity? So don't stretch yourself too thin.

MaryAnn Gramig 24:03

Right, right. Well, I think that's a huge thing for coaches as they want to grow or scale. It is not about more clients, it is not about more hours. You have to remember you are not selling your time, you are selling your expertise, you are selling transformation. And that's what you have to be providing through the services that you're offering. So that's what you're providing. You only have 24 hours in a day. If you are serious about your own self-leadership and well-being, you have to really be just tight on where those hours are being spent. So the first thing is to get alignment with who you are and what your psychological and physical, emotional, spiritual needs are and make sure they're being fed. I always say every coach needs a coach. One of the first things I tell people when they're asking about what to look for in a coach, and I said, Well, one of the questions on your list should be, do you have a coach? If they say no, move on. Every coach needs a coach to just keep you. I can't just stop learning. So I have a coach, and I believe that every coach, and if it's not specifically a coach, you need a good solid mentor that you are regularly meeting with. Then you have to have what your a framework, a simple structure that can be replicated so that you can scale, get as many opportunities to have these one to many opportunities. One of the ways we were able to really impact this organization that we're working with now is uh I have group coaching pods. There are three to four employees at a time in a pod, and they go through group coaching together. So monetarily for scaling a business, it makes sense on paper financially. And then you also have the collective wisdom. You may ask a question that I don't think of during the coaching session, but I'm like, yeah, wow, I've been dealing with that too. And then you hear somebody else say, Yes, I dealt with that last year, and this is how my strengths helped me through that. So it's just builds on itself, but you cannot spread yourself too thin. And then that's why where we got to the point that I had to form a collaborative. I have two other coaches that I asked to come in and form a collaborative, and I hold the uh uh the contract for the organization to work, but it was too large for one coach. So I have two more coaches that come alongside and help me. My business is built on I do not have employees, I have uh contractors that work in areas of the business that I do not have the expertise nor the desire to do everything. So yeah.

Pedro Stein 27:00

Yeah, that makes sense. Now I'm curious about where you're taking all this, you know, looking ahead a bit, where do you see the business going? Are you thinking about scaling, hiring, even if it's on contract model, or is there a next step you're excited about? You know, what future entails?

MaryAnn Gramig 27:17

Yes, yes. Well, I just went through things were getting very spread thin, challenging on navigating everything. And so by working with my business coach, we cut my offers down from four to two, the two I just told you about. My two much longer coaching programs, uh, I let go. Sometimes you have to kill your baby, and uh I I did. Um, so I there were there were great packages, but it just wasn't when you really sit down and look at the numbers uh and have your CFO or your accountant really start crunching and tracking where you are getting traction, what is pulling in the most percentage of revenue, you have to pay attention to that. So we figured out what that was. I went down to these two coaching packages, and the exciting thing is that that has also given me more time to go out to get organizational contracts with my two coaching partners. And the most exciting thing for me is I am beginning to do more keynoting and more breakout sessions for large conferences and corporate gatherings, which is very exciting. Um and around the topic of my book, I published my first book last year. I'm writing my second one now, but it is gaining in popularity as a keynote topic. And I I love that. I love being able to share the message with you know 400, 500 people sitting there um at a time and hoping for to up those numbers.

Pedro Stein 28:52

Okay, you know, and of course, whenever we're aiming towards the next chapter, always something under the hood that we're refining, right? Um what are you currently trying to improve or tighten up in your business right now?

MaryAnn Gramig 29:05

Right. I was working on that right before we got on this call, uh, and that is on the um, I've was asked to do a keynote on passion, passion for your work and time management. And so I and at first I was thinking, okay, and it's 45 minutes. So it's a kind of a big ask, you know, could you cover time management and how to have passion in your work? But really, it's just part of the coaching I do already. Time management becomes much, much easier when you identify the season that you're in, what that passion is, what that really feels in alignment of how you want to serve in this chapter, in this season. The time management piece will almost work itself out if you stay true to what you know you're called to for this season. I work a lot with, like I said, micro goals, but also chapters of life. We have this thing like, oh, I have to know what my you know purpose is for all of life. And I just don't believe that. We go through different seasons of life. My purpose when I was 10 years old, when I was 20 years old, is different than it is now. Life is different, and when we start to feel those shifts, like something's off, I'm not sure. This just doesn't seem to fit anymore. There's nothing wrong with you. The chapter's changing, and that's not a bad thing. It can be scary because it feels wonky and uncertain, but I love to help my clients lean into that and just say, let's explore this instead of being fearful, let's get curious. What's going on? Maybe your strengths have evolved. They should. You've been working with them. What are they trying to tell you that they're ready for now? And it's exciting.

Pedro Stein 31:02

Okay, you know, yeah, that makes sense, you know. Because thinking back, it's like, oh, in a kindergarten in high school, you're like, I'm gonna be friends with this, with Timmy that wants to be a firefighter for all life. And we in reality, we change, right? It's like it is the way I see it, it's like it has an expiring date that we don't know. That's right. It's like eventually this is not gonna work out. I'm gonna change, but yeah, be being aware of that, I think it makes sense because when we talk about goals, people sometimes they they talk in a way that is so fixed, right? Oh, uh, in one year, two years, three years, four, this is gonna happen, and this is gonna happen, and this is gonna happen. Right. And when you mentioned the time management, I have people in the space, like in the coaching space, uh, challenging that uh terminology. Like they they told me it's not time management, it's priority management. How do you feel about that?

MaryAnn Gramig 31:59

I agree completely. My uh presentation that I give, and there's an attached workshop, it's called leading the clock. Because I will just tell an organizer if you name a workshop time management, no one is going to come. That's like your grandpa automatically comes into mind that got a gold watch after 40 years at Ford. Great, but that's not how this generation thinks. So it's leading the clock, and it absolutely people are not overscheduled, Pedro. They are misscheduled because they are misaligned in how they are spending their time. They have to find out what it is now that really makes them want to get up in the morning. And chapters have varying lengths. One of my coaching partners, she's fabulous. She knew at five years old when she was on an international flight with her parents. She said, I want to be an international flight attendant. She was five. It never changed, it never wavered. She's 60 now, but in her late 30s, and she went to college, she got degrees into French and Spanish, and she flew the American Airlines route from Raleigh, North Carolina to Paris, France for years. Then she went up in how she wanted to serve was different. She went into leadership at American Airlines. Then she decided she worked in the uh health and holistic wellness space and became the CEO of a great company there. It kind of changed, but there's still that service model running through serving others, and then now she's a coach and she's a fabulous coach. But at five, she knew what she wanted to do, she made it happen, and so that chapter was a long one for her.

Pedro Stein 33:43

Yes, I I I can we're always evolving, right? At the end of the day, that's it. No, I love that. And if someone wants, you know, listening, wants to connect with you or follow your work, okay? Where can people find you and connect with you? And Marianne, please mention the book name, right? I want to see if people can reach out to that.

MaryAnn Gramig 34:04

Yeah. So it's the howl of the whisper. Calm your inner critic, discover your strengths, and give voice to authentic you. And my website is very easy to remember. CalmyourInercritic.com. So if you hop on calm your inner critic.com, you can link up with me for a quick chat, 20 minutes. And because I know your audience coaches, my people, then just hop on there and can just talk about any question you guys have on your mind. I'm happy to brainstorm with you, and we could probably learn some some cool stuff from each other.

Pedro Stein 34:44

You know, there were a few things you shared today really stood out to me. I would say, like that. Well, first of all, you know, when I we mentioned the nonprofit versus profit, and I'm thinking, right, about the the hat of the coach. But actually, there are there were three hats on the shift. The first one, coach, right? I'm now a coach. The second one, I'm now a business owner, which is one most coaches tend to forget. And you remembered us during our talk when we were talking about if those uh two offers are not working, that matters, you know, that's important too. And that's the the CEO, the business owner taking a making a decision. And the last but not least, and that's very unique to you, which I think it's very interesting to highlight, is like you're coming from a nonprofit background to a profit background. So I understand that coaching is a very passion-driven uh profession, I'll put it like that, but at the same time, it's not a hobby, and it's to pay bills, right? That's right. So you had a three-way shift to make. So I commend you on doing that, you know. I I can only imagine it was super hard, okay. And uh another thing that caught my attention is how you you broke down how the group engagement works and how to impact the people in the front line that actually don't even grasp or understand or were never taken care of. I think it's it shows so much just by being listened to sometimes it's just by shaking hands with the CEO when most people they don't even understand what that looks like, right? They just go click in, click out, go home, click in, click out, go home. And I think that is so powerful. So I commend you not you on that, but also the CEO for for having that mentality. Um, and last but not least, right? I think letting go two of the four packages. I understand, and and killing the baby, let's call it like that. I I understand um the decision from a business point of view, but I also understand how hard it is, right? And and and such a powerful reminder that this is not just by driven by love, but also it is a business, so they kind of mix together, you know, at the end of the day. So this is my long-winded way of saying that I appreciate what you do, and I appreciate you being here sharing so openly today, Marion. It was great having you on, okay?

MaryAnn Gramig 37:15

No, it was great being here, Pedro. Thanks so much for asking me.

Davis Nguyen 37:19

That's it for this episode of Career Coaching Secrets. If you enjoyed this conversation, you can subscribe to YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you're listening to this episode to catch future episodes. This conversation was brought to you by Purple Circle, where we help career coaches scale their business to seven and eight figures without burning out. To learn more about Purple Circle, our community, and how we can help you grow your business, visit joinpurplecircle.com, and the circle.